It’s inevitable that any review of an Emily Brontë biography arriving on the heels of Emerald Fennell’s bonkers adaptation of Wuthering Heights will reference the film (and most have). But I’m in the odd position of having also reviewed Fennell’s movie. This prompted an editor at W.W. Norton & Co. to send me an advance copy of Deborah Lutz’s This Dark Night: Emily Bronte, A Life, which was published in early May 2026. It arrived with a letter suggesting I might enjoy it after my “thrashing” of Wuthering Heights: “It’s not quite roaming the moors, but it’s close.”A lifelong Brontë reader, I received the book eagerly, but did not take its editor’s words literally. Having read it, I realize she meant them that way. There are biographers desperate to know a life from the outside in and the inside out, and there are biographers aware that their subject is fundamentally unknowable. Lutz is the latter, and she works instead to produce a social and domestic history of those closest to Emily, a natural history of the West Yorkshire moors Brontë immortalized in Wuthering Heights, and a material history of Emily’s writing practice which, in the hands of Lutz’s meditative attention, approaches the mystical. “Expertise,” dry and academic, is the wrong word to characterize Lutz’s understanding of the Brontës. Victorianists tend to work exclusively with the established texts of their subjects, but Lutz spent several years immersed in Emily Brontë’s hand-written manuscripts (detailed photographs of these are included in the book) and inhabiting Brontë’s hometown of Haworth, West Yorkshire, and Brussels, where she studied alongside her older sister Charlotte at the Pensionnat Héger. Lutz pored over the local weather reports of Emily’s lifetime and learned the flora and fauna of the moors so integral to Brontë’s life and work (Emily could identify local birds by their song and kept a collection of their feathers she found on her daily walks). In This Dark Night, Lutz’s deep knowledge of Emily Brontë transcends biography and—appropriate for her subject, who wrote one of the most famous ghost stories in Western literature—approaches a haunting.Written after a large cache of papers by the Brontës “that had been missing for over a hundred years” surfaced in 2018, This Dark Night gives readers a great deal of fresh information about Emily Brontë. Even with this new material, Emily remains the most elusive of the four Brontë siblings who survived into adulthood (the two oldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, died in childhood, events Lutz ties convincingly to Emily’s psyche and writing). Although Charlotte Brontë outlived Branwell, Emily, and Anne, she died at thirty-nine of complications from her first pregnancy, and Lutz posits that it was her widower who likely burned most of Emily’s correspondence and diaries.Absent these sources, Lutz employs the candid letters, diaries, and various historiographical accounts of Emily’s father, Patrick, and her siblings to methodically illuminate Emily’s whereabouts and behaviors; these provide a comprehensive and intimate view into Emily’s place in the family pecking order. [...]This Dark Night effectively refutes the lasting image of the Brontës as isolated sad girls, stuck in the sticks with their abusive reverend father, which originated with Elizabeth Gaskell’s now-classic hagiography of her close friend, Charlotte Brontë. Lutz sketches a bustling, industrial Haworth where the Brontë siblings, as the children of the town cleric, were frequently at the center of social life, and Patrick bears no resemblance to the stereotypically restrictive Victorian father of legend. He gave his five daughters the same radical education he gave his only son, tutoring them in foreign languages and allowing unfettered access to the literature of the day (including the scandalous Lord Byron). He aided their travel to London and Brussels, and encouraged their creative writing, refusing to pressure them to marry. Online lit discourse likes to bat at the possibility that Emily Brontë was queer. Lutz won’t go so far as to guess, but she shows us a West Yorkshire where the Brontë siblings knew Anne Lister, the celebrated English diarist and lesbian, whose rarefied education and androgynous appearance modeled a different kind of life for Emily Brontë than the available standard for middle-class Victorian women–one Emily, who never married and devoted her life to art and her sisters, seems to have lived.Emily’s living is at the heart of This Dark Night, which eschews the historically romantic notion of Brontë’s artistic genius that places Wuthering Heights as her singular accomplishment, with life a mere cipher for the novel. [...]This Dark Night is, therefore, literally a biography of the dirt beneath Emily’s feet which subverts the tired trope of Emily Brontë hitching up her skirts and running wild on the moors to instead give us a woman who was both a writer and a naturalist who also ran a household. Wuthering Heights is a book best remembered for the wilderness of its moors which nonetheless takes place almost entirely inside. We think of Cathy’s longing for that wilderness when she is trapped in confinement and the longing, the state of it, feels almost like the place itself. Lutz compels us to wonder if Emily Brontë felt that same longing—not for the moors, which were her literal backyard, but to break free of her human form, to seep into the “rocks and stones and trees” of the world she loved. It’s difficult to say for sure, especially since This Dark Night is so grounded in the physical—gardens, laundry, mending, cooking, dogs, cats, hawks. Yet Lutz captures Brontë’s ineffable desire to break free of her physical body, which is both a graver and braver thing than she might have done with this biography.It’s possible—valuable, even—to reduce a figure like Emily Brontë to the questions that trouble our own gender politics. Emily Brontë might have often wished to be a man, or to love a woman, and these things may have limited her ability to lead the kind of life some of her contemporaries led. To write a book that addresses how Emily Brontë was limited by her gender is one thing. Lutz shows us instead that Emily Brontë’s real limitation was her human form, and how she paradoxically used that form to harness a mysticism and create some of the language’s most lasting works, works which nonetheless elucidate our own gender relations in ways rarely surpassed, even today. That is what a genius does, I suppose.Near the close of the book, Lutz writes that, after Emily’s death, she became the “genius loci” for the remaining family members (only her father, Anne, and Charlotte remained, Branwell having died six months prior). She seemed to me the genius loci of This Dark Night, as well, if it’s possible for a subject to haunt its own book. Because the book is largely constructed of the words of those closest to Emily about Emily, rather than Emily’s own words, we see her in the periphery, or view her from afar. I felt pleasantly haunted throughout my reading of this biography, and was surprised to find myself weeping as it closed. I am a writer, and frequent reader, of biography. The death of the subject is pretty much the one thing you can count on in the genre, but Lutz paces her book so well that Emily’s sudden death seems to happen as quickly on the page as it did in life. The shock of it—Emily refused medical attention and insisted on keeping her eyes open to “meet” her end—took my breath away.I learned more about Emily Brontë and her famous siblings from reading This Dark Night than I knew before. These facts stay with me and yet, the more I learned, the more distant Emily grew. It was as though the attempt to contain her or reduce her to acts or incidents or objects was to break up this person, who was always so evidently more than the sum of her parts, into her parts, and then watch the parts erase the whole. This is no fault of Lutz’s and is part of her book’s great success, since this seems to convey how her contemporaries felt about her. Emily Brontë is long dead. She can never be brought back to life, but we are haunted eternally by her, by the dictum she gave herself.“There is no Emily in Time or on Earth now,” Charlotte is quoted as saying upon her sister’s death, and we feel that loss as keenly today as Charlotte did then—or fool ourselves that we do, or Lutz fools us that we do. If Emily can die like any other, we all can. We all will. This should have left me bereft, or at least a little grim, but instead I was comforted, and reminded of the feeling I have whenever I visit the Brontë Parsonage in Haworth, specifically, and the Calder Valley more broadly, which I try to do every few years. It took me a long time to characterize this feeling, which is a meditative ecstasy that leaves me with a profound sense of well-being. Eventually, I just said it aloud, so here I go: When I am there, in the land that birthed and received Emily Brontë, I feel immortal. Not because of some delusion that I will never die, but because, paradoxically, I am aware that I absolutely will. And life will go on beautifully beyond me. If I am lucky, any small thing I’ve done or said will reach out to the living; maybe they will have a conversation with the dead, like this one, like Lutz’s. Maybe I will talk back. (Emily Van Duyne)
A new music video for "Sirens," from John Caird and Paul Gordon's Jane Eyre A Musical, celebrates the new Jane Eyre EP, Highlights From The UK Premiere Cast. [...]The new EP, from Westway Music, precedes the upcoming production of Jane Eyre A Musical at the Southwark Playhouse Elephant. Performances are scheduled to begin August 28 for a limited run through October 24.With music and lyrics by Gordon and additional lyrics by Caird, the EP also features the songs "Sweet Liberty" and "Secret Soul," both of which were performed by Burn and Gilmour earlier this summer at West End Live. The three-song EP is available to stream/download here.The recording has vocal and incidental music arrangements by Brad Haak and Steve Tyler, orchestrations by Larry Hochman and Haak, sound engineering by Ben Robbins, and mixing by Gordon. It is produced by Adam Blanshay Productions, David and Hannah Mirvish and Westway Music and published by Universal Music and ASCAP.In addition to Burn and Gilmour, the Southwark production will also feature Claire Greenway as Abbot/Grace Poole, Melad Hamidi as St. John/Lord Ingram, Connor Wood as John Reed/Vicar, Jonathan Andrew Hume as Brocklehurst/Mason, Izzi Levine as Agnes/Leah/Jane's Mother/Mary Ingram, Hannah Lindsey as Scatcherd/Bertha Mason, Isabelle Methven as Helen Burns/Bessie, Gemma Page as Reed/Fairfax, and Eve Shanu-Wilson as Blanche/Sophie with Poppy Jason as Young Jane/Adele and Emily-Rose Samuel as Young Jane/Adele.Caird and Broadway's Megan McGinnis will co-direct the musical, with choreography by Georgina Lamb, set and costume design by Morgan Large, sound design by Andrew Johnson, lighting design by James Whiteside, musical direction and supervision by Ben Kubiak, and casting by Sarah-Jane Price.The 2000 Broadway production of Jane Eyre was nominated for five 2001 Tony Awards, including Best Musical. (Andrew Gans)
Servant's Room, Brontë Parsonage MuseumTimes: 11am - 1pm and 2 - 4pmSome of the most intriguing items in our collection are those made from the Brontës' hair. During the Victorian era, hair was often woven into jewellery for remembrance. See conceptual artist and historian Donna Lowson guide us through the history of Victorian hairwork and show us the process of creating hair jewellery during your visit!
The book that changed me as a teenagerI read Wuthering Heights when I was 12 or 13. Heathcliff fascinates me: enigmatic, brooding, never fully explained. Emily Brontë taught me landscape is character. The moors are a living force, mirroring Cathy and Heathcliff’s emotional lives. That shaped my writing: I’m drawn to unknowable characters and psychologically alive places.
Twin City Theatre Company brings Emily Brontë, Teenage Necromancer to Parkland College’s Second Stage Theatre. When a phantom haunts the Roe Head School for Girls in 1835, star pupil Emily Brontë and her sisters Anne and Charlotte must use their necromantic talents to uncover the truth in this gothic comedy of ghosts, fog, an undead goose, a lovesick spirit, and a talking meat pudding. The production runs through August 9. (Associated Press)
Jane EyreI've always thought Jane Eyre is remembered for the wrong reason. Yes, the romance matters. But Jane's refusal to compromise herself matters even more. That's exactly why the love story works. She chooses love without giving up who she is.
9. Wuthering HeightsAudience Score: 74%Critic Score: 57%Emerald Fennell’s adaptation of the literary classic was met with a 57% critic score, with many purists and reviewers balking at the modern sensibilities and controversial changes made to the source material. Audiences were much more enamored with the chemistry between Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, granting the film a 74% rating. Despite being shaded by critics, the general public enjoyed the bold, stylized take on the toxic romance, prioritizing entertainment value over fidelity to the book. (Leah Collins)
It’s an incredible song, and one where I cannot sing Bush’s high notes without stubbing my toe or something. The music video of her dancing makes me wish that MTV was still a thing and I could just spend my time watching fun music videos on cable television instead of battling stupid ads on YouTube. I wish Silicon Valley could invent a time machine. (Andrea Gutierrez)
Against EMI’s wishes, she insisted on releasing the haunting ballad “Wuthering Heights”—inspired by Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel of the same name—as the album’s first single.It was an early example of Bush seizing full control of her own career, and it certainly paid off.“Wuthering Heights” topped the UK and Australian charts, making her the first British woman to reach number one with an entirely self-written track. (Erinn Callahan)
Bush has continued to earn recognition for her extraordinary career, including induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2023. Yet nearly five decades after that remarkable debut, it’s still astonishing to remember that one of rock music’s most important milestones was achieved by a 19-year-old who simply believed the world needed to hear “Wuthering Heights” first. (Andrea Reiher)
If Austen and Brontë had a baby with Bridget Jones, she'd be Emma M. Lion. Super charming, super moreish, super short — 150~ pages each - this series has garnered a mega following for a reason. (Charley Vokoun)
Emily (Filmin)La más enigmática de las hermanas Brontë sigue siendo un misterio a día de hoy. ¿Cómo pudo aquella mujer soltera tan tímida y solitaria, recluida en una pequeña casa parroquial en los páramos de Yorkshire, crear una de las novelas más intensas y apasionadas de la literatura inglesa? Con la intención de responder a esa pregunta nace Emily. Es en esa lucha contra los límites de su vida familiar cuando comienza a anhelar esa libertad artística tan personal. Así comienza un viaje para canalizar su potencial creativo en una de las mejores novelas de todos los tiempos: Cumbres borrascosas. (Cristina Blanco Vázquez) (Translation)´
Dunque la Austen disse il vero, mentre per le sorelle Brontë bisognò aspettare al trono la regina Vittoria, moralista e bacchettona; ci voleva forse una regina così per l’ordito narrativo di Cime Tempestose, capolavoro intraducibile al cinema - ne saranno usciti, di film, venticinque e più. (Vincenzo Mazzaccaro) (Translation)
On this episode, Mia and Sam sit down with art historian and writer Eliza Goodpasture! Eliza has written the introduction to a new edition of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, illustrated by British modern artist Edna Clarke Hall.We take a look at the women studying at the Slade School of Fine Art in the 1890s and how Edna Clarke Hall's marriage influenced her obsession with Cathy and Heathcliff...
The Stars of Tomorrow program of the Twin City Theatre Company presemtsWritten by Don ZouidisDirected by Emily RittterJuly 31st-August 9th7 p.m. on Fridays and at 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays.Parkland College Second Stage TheatreThis darkly funny and imaginative play reimagines the young Emily Brontë as a misunderstood teen with a flair for the supernatural. A celebration of creativity, rebellion, and the power of storytelling.
Further information on WCIA.
This Dark Night: Emily Bronte, A Life by Deborah LutzThe Brontës are having a bit of a moment again with adaptations and a semi-biographical film about Emily herself, and this book does its best to explain the elusive genius. Since the Brontës were not recognized as genius writers until much later, the historical record of their lives is incomplete. However, Lutz uses the poems, journals, and ephemera Emily left behind in her 30 years to piece together her internal life. Emily wrote about grief and commented regularly on nature and the rising industrialism in faraway cities. (Julia Rittenberg)
But it is William Wyler’s 1939 black and white swoonfest that is still ranked top on film review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes. The clothes are pure old Hollywood glamour, the moody cinematography is sublime, Merle Oberon’s Cathy is ethereal, Laurence Olivier’s Heathcliff is brooding. Does it matter that they ditched the second half of the story, ending with the lovers’ ghosts walking hand in hand through the snow? Not really. This is Wuthering Heights reimagined as a Thirties weepie and on its own terms, it is genius. (Ruth Leon)
Anna Yates, Khadija Raza and Joseff Harris join the production ahead of its run across England.The creative team has been set for the new production of Jane Eyre, touring across England in autumn 2026. The production will be directed by Lily Dyble as a result of her winning the 2025 Royal Theatrical Support Trust Sir Peter Hall Director Award. It is based on Sally Cookson, Mike Akers and the original company's acclaimed adaptation of Charlotte Brontë's enduring novel. (Stephi Wild)Tour DatesMercury Theatre, Colchester - 26 September – 10 October 2026Rose Theatre, Kingston - 13 – 24 October 2026Northern Stage, Newcastle - 3 – 7 November 2026Storyhouse, Chester - 10 – 21 November 2026
Earlier this year, Emerald Fennell's Wuthering Heights was an adaptation that gathered some controversy. Some loved it, while others argued it betrayed Emily Brontë's novel completely. Tail between my legs, I was one of the sceptics. While I admired Fennell's creativity, I'd struggled with how dramatically she had strayed from the original story. However, Fennell never pretended it was a true adaptation. She described the film as the version of Wuthering Heights she remembered reading as a 14 year old, a personal interpretation that filled the spaces between Brontë's words with her own imagination. The reviews, however, were a bit brutal. (...) While I did agree with some of these points, it started to unsettle my compliance.Why was I demanding literary fidelity from Wuthering Heights while happily embracing the artistic licence in Tony? The more I thought about it, the more I realised I'd been judging these films by different standards.It's easy to dismiss an adaptation by arguing it isn't faithful to its original text. Accuracy often become the ammunition we reach for once we've already decided we don't like something and want to fire it with criticism. In Wuthering Heights, fidelity suddenly became incredibly important to me. But was it just because I wasn't enjoying the film? (...)I think we've forgotten that truth and fact aren't always the same thing. A film can invent conversations that never happened and still capture something authentic. It can shorten timelines, combine characters to become one or imagine moments between what was recorded as events while remaining truthful to the spirit of the person. (...)If a film can evoke the essence we all knew and loved of (...) Wuthering Heights through a highly stylised memory of reading a book at age 14 – then it has done its job. (Samantha Corry)
El Most Wuthering Heights Day (El día de Cumbres borrascosas) es un evento alegre. Se baila cada julio en decenas de ciudades del mundo, con miles de participantes que emulan la coreografía del videoclip de Kate Bush: brazos que se abren de golpe, giros bruscos, manos que empujan el aire… Su exagerada teatralidad parece contar la historia con el cuerpo y evocar el espíritu de Cathy pidiendo entrar por la ventana. No es un baile bonito ni técnico. Es más bien raro, dramático y un poco fantasmal. Pero da igual bailarlo bien o mal porque nadie ha venido a lucirse, sino a formar parte de la coreografía. (...)La peregrinación a Haworth no es nueva. En noviembre de 1904, una jovencísima Virginia Woolf subió hasta aquí y escribió sobre la visita en un semanario londinense. En el libro de visitas de la casa de las Brontë han firmado, entre otras muchas mujeres, Sylvia Plath y Patti Smith. Durante más de un siglo, hasta aquí han venido sobre todo mujeres que buscaban a otras mujeres. Woolf se preguntaba si esta u otras romerías a las casas de los escritores no serían puro sentimentalismo, y se respondía que solo se justifican cuando el lugar añade algo a los libros. Con las Brontë, concluía, el viaje merecía la pena: Haworth y las hermanas, escribió, encajan “como un caracol en su concha”. Es imposible separar la obra del sitio que la produjo. (...)Siglo y medio después, una de sus colinas está llena de mujeres que no ocultan nada. Se visten todas iguales, de rojo, y en ese uniforme no se borran: se reconocen. Al contemplar la danza, es inevitable pensar en la ironía que produce una obra hecha en el aislamiento más extremo, y cómo sigue generando un mundo propio un siglo y medio después. (...)No es una postal perfecta: es una romería real, con su desorden, su frío, su espera. Y eso es exactamente lo que la salva del kitsch. La gente ha subido a un campo embarrado un día nublado a hacer algo aparentemente ridículo, y lo hace con una entrega absoluta. Ahí está la dignidad del gesto, en que nadie está posando para nadie. Emily, que escribió y describió el páramo como una fuerza anterior a toda ley, sigue convocando a los vivos. Por eso no envejece. (Máriam Martínez-Bascuñán) (Translation)
Other events: Otago Daily News (New Zealand), El Confidencial (Spain), National Post (Canada)...
Despite its spelling, locals pronounce it“GYZ-lee” (rhyming with “guys” and “lee”), and getting it right is often seen as a badge of honour among Yorkshire newcomers. (...)One of Guiseley’s best-known landmarks is St Oswald’s Church, parts of which are centuries old.The church holds special literary significance as the wedding venue of Patrick Brontë and Maria Branwell, parents of the famous Brontë sisters.Fans of Yorkshire's literary heritage often visit the church as part of their travels.
[Dr. Leonard] Sax advocates for “gender-aware” instructional strategies in K-12 schools.
“The best way to get boys excited about Emily Dickinson is very different from the best way to get girls excited about Emily Dickinson,” he said. “And the best way to get girls excited about computer coding is very different from the best way to get boys excited about computer coding.
“But you put in place gender-aware instructional strategies.”
When educators ignore gender differences, Sax added, they ultimately reinforce gender stereotypes.
“If you understand gender differences, you can break down gender stereotypes. And that same boy who loves football and video games will love ‘Jane Eyre’ and will love Emily Dickinson.” (Jason Swensen)
Two hundred and eight years since Emily was born in Thornton, and she's had the kind of year we don't usually get: a box-office hit and an auction record, back to back, both loud enough that you didn't need to be a Brontëite to notice.
On screen. Emerald Fennell's adaptation opened in February to the kind of divided reception this novel seems to specialise in provoking — a middling critical consensus, a lukewarm CinemaScore, and audiences who showed up anyway. It topped the box office on debut and kept climbing, eventually closing out around $242 million worldwide, making it one of the biggest releases of the year regardless of what anyone thought of Margot Robbie's Cathy or the liberties taken with the source. Whatever your verdict on the film itself, it did the one thing adaptations rarely manage: it got people who hadn't opened the book since school arguing about it again.
Under the hammer. Then, on 30 June, Christie's put the record to rest on a question that's lingered for a while: what is a first edition of Wuthering Heights actually worth now? The three-volume 1847 set — bound with Anne's Agnes Grey, still in its original publisher's cloth, one of only a handful of surviving copies in that condition since a copy last came to auction in 1908 — sold for £1,206,500. That's not just a record for Emily; Christie's confirmed it as the highest price ever paid at auction for a printed book by a woman, and the most expensive piece of 19th-century literature to change hands, full stop. The Ellis Bell pseudonym on the title page suddenly reads very differently against that number.
Oh, the irony. A book published under a man's name because nobody in 1847 believed a woman could write something this unruly just set the price record for any book by a woman, ever. Emily never saw a second printing, never mind a seven-figure hammer price. She'd probably have found both the film and the auction faintly ridiculous — but she'd have taken the money.
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The Stars of Tomorrow program of the Twin City Theatre Company’s is debuting its next production this weekend.Director Emily Ritter and Producer Chm. on Saturdays and Sunandra Galloway came on The Morning Show to talk about their organization and to preview their upcoming production: Emily Brontë: Teenage Necromancer. The show will run on Friday, Saturday and Sunday for the next two weekends at Parkland College’s Second Stage Theatre.Performances will be at 7 p.m. on Fridays and at 2 p.days.
A sea of red gathered on the moors for a day of music, movement and literary celebration.A total of 500 people took part in 'Mass Wuthering' in Haworth on July 26, 2026, an annual event inspired by Kate Bush’s iconic Wuthering Heights music video.The gathering saw fans don red dresses and recreate the famous dance against the backdrop of the Yorkshire landscape that inspired Emily Brontë’s novel and Bush’s 1978 hit. (...)Ms [Clare] O’Callaghan said: "We had fans of Kate Bush, fans of the Brontës, and people from all over the world who wanted to share the joy of how literature and the arts can inspire and cultivate community."It really was a day of community and cohesion, and we’ve been overwhelmed by the brilliant messages we’ve received from people - and those we’ve seen posting on social media - saying it was one of the most memorable experiences of their lives."We all got drenched on Sunday thanks to the ‘Wuthering’ weather, but it didn’t matter at all - it made it even better and the atmosphere was brilliant." (Amelia Short)
While the latest adaptation of Wuthering Heights may have divided critics and audiences, the film starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi helped put Yorkshire in the global spotlight.This was symbolised by a huge billboard in New York’s famous Times Square showing Robbie sitting on the Moors alongside a caption reading ‘It’s Not Wuthering Heights Without England’.The billboard was a small part of Visit Britain’s ‘Starring GREAT Britain’ campaign to boost international tourism to the UK which sought to highlight popular TV shows and films as a way of drawing visitors here.Visit Britain worked with international film and TV studios to target ‘high value’ international audiences in countries like the US, France, Germany and Australia and the Gulf.Patricia Yates, chief executive of VisitBritain, explained in the organisation’s most recent results that Wuthering Heights had played a central role in this year’s campaign.“Last year VisitBritain launched its ‘Starring GREAT Britain’ campaign,” she says. “This was the culmination of a monumental effort by VisitBritain teams across the globe who negotiated partnerships with nine studios to produce an incredible campaign platform on which to build.“In its first six months alone, the campaign generated an additional £217m in visitor spend.“Each extra pound represents a boost for the UK economy, a small business supported and a job sustained. The team has not lost momentum.“The release of Bridgerton Series 4 and Emerald Fennell’s adaptation of Wuthering Heights told a compelling story of regional Britain. VisitBritain secured new Wuthering Heights intellectual property for the campaign showing Yorkshire’s iconic moors and hosted media, buyers and influencers from around the world in Yorkshire. [...]While productions like All Creatures Great and Small and Wuthering Heights may be helping to give Yorkshire a wider international profile, there is still much to be done to keep the region’s hard-working tourism businesses deservedly centre-stage. (Chris Burn)
I ask Jenny [Hill, lead curator] to tell me how the cotton mill owner got hold of a folio in the first place. Jenny grins at her colleague Charlotte [Craig]. One theory is that it came from nearby Ponden Hall. Ponden had one of the largest private libraries not just in the West Riding, but in the whole of Europe. Charlotte has a theory about some of Ponden Hall’s close neighbours who might have used their library.“Well, Ponden Hall is just two or three miles across the moors from Haworth.”“Oh, no!” I gasp “From Haworth Parsonage, where the Brontë sisters lived?”“That’s right,’ says Charlotte. “I used to work there.”“Are you saying that the Brontë sisters might have read this copy of the First Folio?”“We know they used to borrow books from Ponden Hall. But I can’t prove they read this folio.”“Just say it!” I explode. “Let somebody else disprove it. Oh, that is fantastic. What about that!”James smiles wryly. He thinks I’m mad. Jenny and Charlotte very kindly took the folio out of its case and carried it upstairs for me to examine more closely. While they were doing so, I did a bit of research. I remembered a reference to a letter Charlotte Brontë had written to a school friend about Shakespeare. By the time Jenny and Charlotte had laid out the folio upstairs, I had found the letter online.Jenny points out that the folio is missing quite a few pages, and doesn’t have any of the Comedies. So I tell them about Charlotte’s letter dated 4 July 1834, to Ellen Nussey. “Ellen was her best friend at school,” Charlotte interjects.“If you like poetry let it be first rate, Milton, Shakespeare, Thomson, Goldsmith, Pope (if you will though I don’t admire him), Scott, Byron, Campbell, Wordsworth and Southey. Now Ellen don’t be startled at the names of Shakespeare, and Byron. Both these were great men and their works are like themselves. You will know how to choose the good and avoid the evil, the finest passages are always the purest, the bad are invariably revolting you will never wish to read them over twice. Omit the comedies of Shakespeare.”Omit the comedies of Shakespeare. And the Skipton copy has no comedies.“Perhaps Charlotte ripped them out,” Jenny laughs.“This just gets better and better,” I say. “Charlotte, you’ve got to get this story out there.”Once we have all calmed down a little, I tell Jenny that despite its now even more fascinating history, I think it might be the grubbiest copy of the First Folio I have ever seen. “Could you not say ‘grubbiest,’” Jenny grins. “Could you perhaps say ‘well-loved’?”The well-thumbed Skipton copy has become one of my very favourite copies of the First Folio, whether or not anyone can prove that the Brontë sisters ever read it.
Earlier this year, Emerald Fennell’s much-maligned, Mills & Boon-coded bonkbuster Wuthering Heights (2026) proved a great litmus test for how both film critics and film-industry tech bros have been failing to read the room. Fennell turned down Netflix’s $150 million distribution offer and its associated Faustian pact which demanded that the film go straight to streaming. Instead, she went for Warner Bros for $70-$80 million, with whom she got her theatrical release. On the day I watched Wuthering Heights in the cinema this February, Variety reported that it had already grossed $151.7 million worldwide against an $80 million production budget. This certainly wasn’t because it had been lauded in the press: the film was widely ripped to shreds by critics. Yet I can assure you that the much younger audience alongside which I saw it didn’t seem to care. It turns out that audiences are not brute forces capable only of liking or disliking, but sensitive instruments that might derive their enjoyment from camp, irony, strangeness, or the purely preposterous. (Sophia Satchell-Baeza)
When Cohen first walks out onstage, she is wide-eyed and holding a candlestick. Before long, she launches into her first song, “By the Sea,” a catchy tune that also helps to explain the Victorian aesthetic of both her costume and the set. (While working with scenic designer Derek McLane, Cohen was variously inspired by Wuthering Heights and images of Gothic palaces and sanatoriums on Pinterest.) “I always wanted to be the main character and the author and the lighthouse,” she tells the audience. (Alex Jhamb Burns)
‘The Chateau on Sunset’ by Natasha Lester“If you must get into trouble, do it at the Marmont,” reads the opening of this gothic novel set at the Chateau Marmont in 1950s Hollywood. It’s hard to imagine getting into good trouble these days at the Chateau — a relic of a bygone era. Thankfully our protagonist, Aria Jones, does it for us. A midcentury reimagining of “Jane Eyre,” the novel captures the feverish glamour and underlying chaos of the studio era, with each character proving more cunning and bewildering than the last. The result is a gothic tale with a distinctly Old Hollywood twist, paying homage to the enduring mystique of the Chateau Marmont. The dialogue is so taut and snappy, you’ll find yourself holding your breath. Madness, cruelty and difficult women are welcome bedfellows at “The Chateau on Sunset.” (Maddie Connors)
“Flirting is a woman’s trade, one must keep in practice.” (Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre)
LaSexta (Spain) posts about Wuthering Heights.
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Eine Sammlung der schönsten Gedichte, Geschichten, Zitate und Briefauszüge zum Herbst – Die perfekte Lektüre für gemütliche StundenReclam Verlag, DitzingenISBN: 978315014922513 Jul 2026»Und dieser Wind, der in den Kiefern vor den Fenstern heult. Lass mich ihn bitte spüren, er kommt direkt vom Moor herunter. Lass mich nur einen Atemzug tun!«Sturmumwehte Anwesen und nebelbedeckte Moore bilden die ikonischen Schauplätze der Romane der Schwestern Charlotte, Emily und Anne Brontë. Ob in Jane Eyre, Sturmhöhe oder Agnes Grey – mit ihrem aufmerksamen wie auch verträumten Blick gelingt es jeder Schwester, die herbstliche Melancholie auf ganz eigene Weise literarisch einzufangen.
In telling the story of Brontë’s life, Lutz’s method is demarcated by two commitments. First is her interest in Brontë’s world and her place in it. To pursue this, she reconstructs what Brontë ‘wore, saw, heard, smelled, and felt along her skin’ using, among other things, weather reports, the diaries of her neighbours, and local newspapers. This attention to the everyday and the senses offers a thoughtful (and relatively new) approach in Brontë biography, and it is one well suited to Lutz’s established interests, which readers of her 2015 work, The Brontë Cabinet: Three Lives in Nine Objects, will recognise. The second is that This Dark Night joins an established tradition that frames Brontë in relation to the natural world and foregrounds the environment as context for understanding her. For Lutz, as for many before her, Brontë ‘brought the open sky, birdsong, and the peat bogs to life on the page’. The imagery is vivid and compelling, participating in a romantic imaginary that tries to enter the inner mind of a woman who conjured some 200 poems (or thereabouts, that we know of and survive) and, of course, Wuthering Heights. At the same time, Lutz’ environmental emphasis also opens onto Brontë’s preoccupation with darker worlds, such as the dungeons, caves, and graves that dominate her writing, as well as ‘the mortal body’. Neither strand is, in itself, entirely new, but the way Lutz binds them together through sustained sensorial attentiveness feels fresh and it sharpens our historical understanding of Brontë as a multifaceted and complex woman.Importantly, This Dark Night delves into territories that earlier biographers have overlooked, such as, for example, the practical question of how the Brontë sisters managed menstruation, which Lutz answers by drawing on broader health histories rather than evidence specific to the Brontës. This kind of detail may not deepen our understanding of Brontë as a writer, but that is not its purpose. Rather, it is a reminder that the sisters were flesh-and-blood women negotiating a monthly cycle that shapes women’s lives – a seemingly obvious fact that can easily be forgotten amid the iconography and fandom that surround them. It is these reflections that exemplify This Dark Night at its best: Lutz’s care for the material, embodied conditions of Victorian womanhood, which lends biography historic specificity.
Wuthering Heights: 500 people gather at Penistone Country Park in Haworth for celebration. Participants gathered at Penistone Country Park in Haworth for Actually the Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever on Sunday - a celebration of all things Wuthering Heights, Kate Bush and Emily Brontë.The gathering was in the stunning setting of the Haworth moors. 500 people took part in the mass 'Wuther' in a joyful, windswept, red-dress sea of Cathys dancing for charity, supporting Women’s Aid. (DanieL Sheridan)
Eleven classic novels stand in a row on a bookshelf in a library. I find each of them tempting, but in the end, I pick up only one of them.(1) The horror classics Frankenstein and Dracula both stand to the right of the book I chose.(2) Moby Dick and Animal Farm both stand to the left of the book I chose.(3) Two of the books are by Jane Austen. Of these, Pride and Prejudice stands somewhere right of Emma.(4) Pride and Prejudice also stands somewhere right of Frankenstein.(5) There are two titles by two of the Brontë sisters, Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, with two other books (not by the sisters) standing between them.(6) Two books stand between Wuthering Heights and Moby Dick(7) Great Expectations (right) and Animal Farm (left) stand on either side of Wuthering Heights.(8) I notice two children’s favourites, with Heidi standing somewhere to the left of Oliver Twist. There are seven books between these two.(9) Six books stand between Dracula and Wuthering Heights.(10) The book I finally choose stands in the middle of the row of 11, i.e. sixth from either left or right. (Kabir Firaque)
Many news outlets cover the Haworth event, or the Folkestone (Kent) one or the Bunbury one or...: London Now, WION, Bunbury Herald, The Independent, Kent Online, Kent Live, La Razón, Corriere della Sera...
Jane Eyre by Charlotte BrontëCharlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre is much more than just a love story. The novel follows Jane, an orphan who endures a lonely childhood before becoming a governess at the isolated Thornfield Hall. There, she meets the estate's enigmatic owner, Edward Rochester, whose cold demeanor and mysterious past immediately set him apart from the typical romantic hero. The narrative shows Jane and Rochester growing closer, but their relationship is constantly tested by secrets, painful sacrifices, and impossible moral choices that force Jane to decide whether love is worth compromising her own principles.The best thing about Jane Eyre is that, unlike many romances of its time, it never allows love to overshadow its heroine's individuality. Jane refuses to sacrifice her self-respect and independence, even if that means walking away from the man she loves. That gives the novel a remarkable sense of maturity that has influenced generations of romance writers, but few have matched Brontë's sensibilities. (Safwan Azeem)
Llevaba demasiados años escuchando que Jane Eyre era una de las mejores novelas jamás escritas. Cuando por fin la terminé entendí que no era una exageración. No solo he leído un clásico; he sentido que acababa de descubrir el origen de muchas de las historias románticas y de misterio que vinieron después. Y lo mejor de todo es que, lejos de sentirse antigua, me ha tenido completamente atrapado durante toda la lectura. (...)Cuando cerré Jane Eyre entendí por qué sigue apareciendo en cualquier lista de las mejores novelas de la historia. No es solo una historia de amor inolvidable; es la historia de una mujer que se niega a renunciar a sí misma, incluso cuando hacerlo parece el camino más fácil. Hay clásicos que se leen por obligación o por cultura general. Jane Eyre, en cambio, se disfruta de principio a fin y demuestra que las grandes historias no entienden de siglos, porque siguen emocionando exactamente igual hoy que cuando Charlotte Brontë las escribió. (Translation)
3. HathersageHathersage has strong literary connections - having inspired Charlotte Brontë while she was writing Jane Eyre. The nearby North Lees Hall (pictured here) also became the main inspiration for Thornfield Hall. The Grave of Little John, Robin Hood’s second-in-command, can be found at St. Michael’s Church in the heart of Hathersage. While there is little evidence proving he is buried here, ballads suggest that he originated from Hathersage and settled there again later in his life. (Tom Hardwick)
The House Where the Brontës Still Sing
Chronicle of Guiem Soldevila's Brontë concert
Fosquets Lithica Festival, 2 July 2026 (Ciutadella de Menorca, Spain)Guiem Soldevila's sold outinaugural concert, dedicated to the Brontë sisters, captured the spirit of the festival like few others could. The Fosquets Lithica festival is fast becoming an international reference point among world-music festivals in Menorca, and there could be no better fit than a concert by a composer born in Menorca who reaches for the world to prove it.Edition after edition, a carefully curated programme has revealed its identity in an offering that is culture in the fullest sense — not only theatrical, but communal. It is not just the space itself, but how the people who work there inhabit it. From the stonecutters of the past to today's programmers, an unbroken lineage of effort, love and craft.Guiem Soldevila and his group of nine artists joined the expanding ripple of creative energy that was born in the Brontë sisters' house in England in 1845, and which reached us last night in the form of an emotional, vibrant, serene concert.Throughout the concert, writer Carme Cloquells acted as our guide, reading from her logbook of the sea of emotions, painting a literary portrait of each of the sisters. Through thirteen musical settings of poems by the three sisters, we experienced a complete emotional journey. The composition was, without doubt, rich in symbolism. The a cappella trio of voices that opened the concert represented the voices of the three sisters.With Emily Brontë, the music was predominantly built on irregular time signatures, gentle melodies and deep expression. The orchestration, superbly judged, culminated in a small cello-and-flute duet performed by Clara Gorrias and Pau Cardona, evoking the sound of an English Renaissance romance.Anne Brontë, with her soft, clear and committed voice, was represented by a duduk played by Pep Eroles, accompanied throughout by Andreu Marquès's evocative percussion. Perhaps one of the most magical moments of the concert, paired with dance. And yes, magic does exist, and its name is Gêliah. Few people can command the magnetism of attention simply by walking on stage. The cadence of her walk, the lightness of her arms, the intensity of her gaze… Then she dances, yes, or even makes a handkerchief dance, but what she really does is enchant us with her simplicity.When it came to representing Charlotte Brontë, the eldest sister, the music grew more angular, with insistent rhythms, while still finding, amid so much strength, moments of serenity. I found the setting of the poem “On the Death of Anne Brontë” especially inspired, with a deep lament performed by Lluís Gener — perhaps a nod to the laments of Purcell and Dowland — over which the elegiac voices of Guiem, Neus and Clara rested.This was a concert to be praised not only for the quality of its compositions, but also for the quality of its performers. At the imaginary dinner table ofthe Brontë house sit Clara Gorrias, Neus Ferri, Pau Cardona, Elena Armenteros, Lluís Gener, Andreu Marquès, Pep Eroles, Gêliah and Carme Cloquells. The Brontës are no longer just Guiem's project; for an hour, they also become the home of these nine artists.In a conversation between friends, while the Brontë project was still taking shape, Clara Gorrias confided in me: “I never thought I would immerse myself so deeply in this world, partly drawn in by Guiem's enthusiasm. I had also never seen myself working under the leadership of a man who does it with such care, listening, respect and openness.”Perhaps it is no coincidence that a concert dedicated to three women who wrote from freedom was born from a way of creating rooted in listening. The way we work, too, ends up making its own sound.Pau Marquès i Oleo
The sun may be hiding behind grey clouds, but for hundreds of people in flowing red dresses dancing on Yorkshire moorland it'll take more than a threat of rain to dampen their spirits.This is Brontë country, after all, so it's fitting that it's also perfect Brontë weather.The group, swaying in unison, have come together to re-create the music video for Kate Bush's 1978 song Wuthering Heights, inspired by Emily Brontë's novel.Every year, thousands of people around the world don red robes – and in some cases long black wigs – for The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever.Events have previously taken place in places such as Sydney, Copenhagen, Berlin, Folkestone and Preston.This particular "Mass Wuther" perhaps has an even stronger claim than most – it's held on Penistone Hill, not far from the famous Brontë parsonage in Haworth, in the Pennines.From the field on a clear day can be seen the ruined farmhouse of Top Withens, believed to be the inspiration for the titular farmhouse of Brontë's novel. (Fiona Callow)
It’s a bitterly cold Dunedin morning when a bright red wave of Kate Bush lookalikes gathers in the Octagon to dance. By noon, the temperature is a brutal four degrees (feels like -0, according to the weather app), and as the winter sun peeks through the grey clouds above Dunedin’s city centre, the group of dancers dressed in red waits quietly. When the opening piano notes of Kate Bush’s song ‘Wuthering Heights’ burst out, they begin to move in unison, lifting their arms and waving them above their heads. As their crimson clothes blow in the icy wind, Bush sings the famous line that today takes on a new meaning: “Heathcliff it’s me, I’m Cathy, I’ve come home… I’m so cold.” (Tara Ward)
Or BBC in Bristol, Euronews, The Jonesboro Sun, The Adelaide Advertiser, Hello Rayo, in Folkestone...
For her debut album called The Kick Inside, Bush’s first official single was “Wuthering Heights.” Inspired by the classic novel of the same name by Emily Brontë, Bush wrote the track in the span of one night the year before, when she was just 18 years old.Still a teenager by the time the song officially came out, Bush’s music was an impressive success and a huge start to her career. In particular, “Wuthering Heights” gained a lot of fans.The song is a story told from the perspective of the character Catherine Earnshaw after her death, when she’s a ghost pleading with her former love, Heathcliff. Just like how she wrote the song in a few hours, Bush also recorded her vocals for the tune in one take.The mixing for “Wuthering Heights” took place over the course of one night as well, starting at midnight and going until around six in the morning. Music engineer Jon Kelly recalled working with Bush on the song. (Devon Forward)
6. Haworth, West YorkshireA steam train service arrives at Haworth in West Yorkshire, one of the most beautiful places in EnglandYou may not think that you know this Yorkshire town, but you’ve probably seen its steep street, which climbs up the valley of the River Worth, on screen. Haworth is popular with location scouts for film and TV, and many of its lugubrious millstone grit houses have become whimsical shops selling everything from hemlock candles and vintage dresses to “fat tyke” biscuits. The town has one foot in another era, especially when the steam locomotives from the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway chunter into its station. The Brontë sisters grew up in the parsonage at the top of the street — it is now a museum that details how claustrophobic and intense their upbringing must have been. Further uphill from the parsonage, the moors beckon anyone who wants to wuther a few heights. We’d recommend staying close to the Brontë parsonage in the thoughtfully renovated boutique guesthouse Weavers of Haworth. (Andrew Eanes)
Cumbres Borrascosas pertenece a ese linaje, y así se lee mayoritariamente: como una historia de amor imposible entre Catherine Earnshaw y Heathcliff, una pasión tan poderosa que ni la muerte logra extinguirla.Es una lectura legítima pero incompleta porque Emily Brontë no escribió solo una historia de amor. Escribió al mismo tiempo una novela de terror.El terror que Brontë explora es más moderno y perturbador que el terror gótico popular en aquella época: el miedo que puede causar la convivencia doméstica con alguien que nos odia. La diferencia esencial entre Cumbres Borrascosas y sus predecesores en el género del amor obsesivo es que aquí la pasión no se consuma ni se frustra en un instante glorioso: se pudre durante décadas, se transforma en rencor sistemático y aplasta a quienes tienen la desgracia de estar cerca. No hay ningún Romeo que muera joven y hermoso. Hay un Heathcliff que vive demasiado tiempo.La pasión de Heathcliff por Catherine es real e irreductible, y la novela la trata con toda su complejidad, tal y como veremos en el apartado siguiente. Frente a esto, lo que define a Heathcliff como personaje no es lo que siente por Catherine, sino lo que hace con ese sentimiento cuando la sociedad —y la propia Catherine— lo rechaza por su origen. Lo que comienza como un malentendido marcado por la confusión entre lo que Catherine siente y lo que cree que debe ser desencadena en Heathcliff un odio que se vuelve sistemáticamente contra quienes no tienen ninguna culpa: Isabella Linton, su esposa, a la que somete con crueldad calculada; y la segunda generación, a la que manipula y arruina sin remedio. (Read more) (Translation) (Eduardo Antuña Zarzuelo)
Wuthering Heights of Opulence. I visited the English region made famous by Wuthering Heights with old-fashioned villages and celeb-visited hotels. (...)Despite the changeable weather – one minute I’d be battered by gusts that pierced like kitchen knives, the next smothered in mist then bathed in sunshine – I instantly fell head over heels in love with the moors.Emily Brontë and her sisters Charlotte and Anne grew to adore these wilds, right on their doorstep.I hiked to ruined farmstead called Top Withens, said to have inspired Wuthering Heights the fictional home of Cathy.A further trek then took me to the Brontë Waterfall, Brontë Bridge, and Brontë Chair rock (in the shape of a seat), which were all places close to the sisters’ hearts.Back in Haworth, the limestone cottages and cobbled main street lined with gift shops, cafes and pubs had an old-fashioned charm.At the sisters’ old home, now the Brontë Parsonage Museum, I saw the simple wooden table where they used to write. (Fiona Whitty)
Nu Sass, a company that promotes marginalized genders in all aspects of theater, presents Courtney Bailey’s “Brontë Sister House Party” (Aug. 14-Sept. 12) at Van Ness on Main Street (4340 Connecticut Ave., NW). In life, the Brontë Sisters, Emily, Charlotte, and Anne, wrote their 19th century English lit classics in the virtual isolation of their father’s remote York parsonage. Now, stuck in purgatory, they’re suffering through party after party in an endless time loop. For them, hosting is truly hell, until they finally find a way to make it tolerable. (Patrick Folliard)
In conclusione, la citazione ci consegna una straordinaria meditazione sull’interiorità umana. Ci ricorda che siamo anche, e forse soprattutto, ciò che abbiamo sognato. Che non tutto ciò che conta deve essere realizzato per essere vero. Che alcune delle nostre trasformazioni più autentiche derivano non da eventi visibili, ma da visioni invisibili, che attraversano il tempo e noi stessi. Ed è forse proprio in questa alterazione silenziosa che si nasconde la vera poesia dell’essere. (Patrizio Lo Votrico) (Translation)
Times Now News compiles some beautiful and/or brutal love confessions in literature (with a lot of sloppy AI illustrations), quoting Wuthering Heights. AnneBrontë.org posts about when Charlotte Brontë quietly used her connections with publisher George Smith to help friend Harriet Martineau attempt a secret, anonymous return to novel-writing in 1851 — a book that was ultimately never published.
